Thursday, March 25, 2010

Just when we were looking to fill a display space, our new shipment of Ox-Tales arrived. This is a series of four collections, each based on the four elements, earth, air, fire and water. Proceeds go to Oxfam.

And yes, if you are following Project Runway, this arrives just weeks after their four elements challenge, which I found strangely colorless. Here's what Tim Gunn had to say.

The contributors are amazing:

Earth

Rose Tremain

Jonathan Coe

Marti Leimbach

Kate AtkinsonIan Rankin

Marina Lewycka

Hanif Kureishi

Jonathan Buckley (OK, I've never heard of him)

Nicholas Shakespeare

Air

Alexander McCall Smith

Helen Simpson

DBC Pierre

AL Kennedy

Kamila Shamsie

Beryl Bainbridge

Louise Welsh

Diran Adebayo (here's the second unknown to me)

Helen Fielding

Fire

Mark Haddon

Geoff Dyer

Victoria Hislop (don't know)

Sebastian Faulks

John le Carre

Xiaolu Guo

William Sutcliffe (don't know #4)

Ali Smith

Lionel Shriver

Jeanette Winterson

Water

Esther Freud

David Park (unknown to me--don't you ever play this game with lists?)

Hari Kunzru

Zoe Heller

Michel Faber

William Boyd

Joanna Trollope

Giles Foden

Michael Morpurgo (???)

And each volume contains a poem by Vikram Seth.

To the folks I don't know, I hope to be making your acquaintance (storywise) soon! Meanwhile, here's a photo of Jason, the proud buyer of this new arrival.